A fine and rare underglaze-blue and yellow-enamel 'Gardenia' dish, Mark and Period of Hongzhi. Photo: Sotheby's. 

the shallow rounded sides rising from a tapered foot to an everted rim, freely painted in shaded tones of cobalt reserved on a rich yellow ground, the interior with a slightly recessed medallion enclosing a leafy branch bearing two five-petalled gardenia blooms and two tightly closed buds, encircled on the cavetto by fruiting branches of pomegranate, grape, crab apple and a beribboned lotus bouquet, all between double-line borders, the underside with a continuous scroll of seven large blooming roses borne on a foliate stem, between double lines at the rim and foot, the slightly convex base left white and inscribed in underglaze blue with a six-character reign mark within double circles; 26.4 cm., 10 3/8  in. Estimation 3,000,000 — 4,000,000 HKD (301,791 - 402,388 EUR) 

Provenance: Sotheby's Hong Kong, 26th October 2003, lot 131. 

This striking gardenia design in underglaze blue against a vivid yellow ground was first created in the Xuande period and continued to be produced until the Jiajing reign, peaking in popularity during the Hongzhi period. This dish is notable for the particularly boldly painted fruit and flowering branches which capture a sense of dynamism. A closely related example, in the Palace Museum, Beijing, is published in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum. Blue and White Porcelain with Underglazed Red (II), Shanghai, 2000, pl. 231; one from the Carl Kempe collection, illustrated in Oriental Ceramics. The World's Great Collections, vol. 8, Tokyo, 1982, pl. 226; another in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, included ibid, vol. 11, col. pl. 16; and a fourth from the Sir Percival David Collection and now in the British Museum, London, published in Margaret Medley, The Chinese Potter, Oxford, 1976, pl. 168. See also a dish of this type sold in these rooms, from the Meiyintang Collection, 7th April 2011, pl. 57.  

Soame Jenyns in Ming Pottery and Porcelain, London, 1953, illustrates four different examples, two of the Xuande and Chenghua periods from the British Museum, London, a Hongzhi dish from the Riesco collection, Croydon, and a Zhengde piece from the Sir Percival David Collection, now also in the British Museum, pls. 56 and 57a. A rare Jiajing dish of this design in the Meiyintang collection is illustrated in Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, London, vol. 2, 1994, pl. 684. 

Sotheby's. Important Ming Porcelain from a Private Collection. Hong Kong | 08 oct. 2013 - http://www.sothebys.com